Graduation Year
2016
Document Type
Thesis
Degree
Ph.D.
Degree Name
Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)
Degree Granting Department
Communication
Major Professor
Arthur Bochner, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Carolyn Ellis, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Keith Berry, Ph.D.
Committee Member
Shawn Bingham, Ph.D.
Keywords
First-generation college students, working class, social class, identity negotiation, family research, autoethnography
Abstract
This dissertation explores one white working-class family’s hopes, fears, illusions, and tensions related to social mobility. I tell stories from my experiences as a first-generation college student, including: ethnographic fieldwork; interviews with my family, community members, and former teachers; and narratives from other working-class academics to provide an in-depth, evocative, and relational look at mobility. I explore the roots of vulnerability in my family and how I was socialized into understanding belonging and worthiness in particular ways, and how this socialization influences my feelings of belonging and worthiness in the academy. The goal of this research is bridging – past and present selves, working-class and academic cultures, work and family – for me and my family and other first-generation students and their families.
Scholar Commons Citation
Hodges, Nathan Lee, "Blue-Collar Scholars: Bridging Academic and Working-Class Worlds" (2016). USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations.
https://digitalcommons.usf.edu/etd/6256
